


Virgil - Memory Loss

by HedwigsTalons



Series: Hedwig's Bad Things Happen Bingo [3]
Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: Gen, Memory Loss, compulsory online training, head fog
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:02:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26823355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HedwigsTalons/pseuds/HedwigsTalons
Summary: Sometimes there is nothing quite as tortuous as mandatory online training courses
Series: Hedwig's Bad Things Happen Bingo [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1956313
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	Virgil - Memory Loss

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CreativeGirl29](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CreativeGirl29/gifts).



> A Bad Things Happen Bingo fic for CreativeGirl29 who requested Virgil for the Memory Loss square

Virgil stared at the screen in front of him, the bold figure denoting his score was worryingly low, the word ‘FAIL’ standing out starkly in bold black letters on the white screen. How on Earth could he _fail_? The material had been basic to the point of tedium. The information he had been forced to read through had been pitched insultingly low. 

And yet there was the result.

FAIL

It mocked him in a way that wanted him to hurl the tablet across the room.

Movement to his left dragged his eyes from the screen. The terrible two, matching grins, high-fives, tablets discarded on the table top, the twin green ticks left on the screens a kick in the teeth. Scott had already left 10 minutes previously, the first to finish what was meant to be a standard box-ticking exercise.

An exercise he had failed.

Left alone, he dropped his head onto folded arms and let out a deep sigh. He _knew_ this stuff. Hell, even a fairly switched on eight year old could probably pass the test _without_ ploughing through the mind-numbing screens of information that had sent him into a glazed stupor. 

A subtle cough dragged his head up and he rubbed at eyes that were tired from far too long spent clicking through near identical screens.

John.

Of course it would be John. John would have known from the moment he’d hit the final submission button that he had failed. Failure was not something that came naturally to a Tracy, especially not over something so trivial. 

“You okay there?”

“Do I _look_ like I’m okay?” he growled, frustrated at himself more than anything, the holographic sibling in front of him was just an east target. “Just...just reset the damn test and I’ll do it again. I caught a few wrong buttons by accident.”

It was an easy enough lie. The answers to the multiple choice questions in the test each had tiny buttons next to them and it was entirely plausible that he’d brushed the wrong part of the touch screen. Much better than admitting that by the time he’d got through the training materials and onto the test he was in such a comatose state that his mind had gone completely blank. Each question had been pure guesswork as he probed the depths of his mind and drawn a blank. 

Guesses that evidently hadn’t been good enough.

Stupid damn test.

Stupid GDF requirements.

He’d been less than impressed when Scott had announced they all had to complete some new requirement to keep their operations licence. Bland, corporate branded slides filled with stock photos of fake office workers wearing plastic grins. Frame after frame of click through information that was condescending in the level it was pitched at. One of the units was fire safety. Fire safety for goodness sake. As if the image of someone pointing a fire extinguisher at a waste bin bore any resemblance to what he dealt with day to day.

Still, the rules had been set. All IR personnel had to complete the training and submit their certificates at the end.

Easy.

Except by the time he’d ploughed through the information and reached the final quiz his brain had turned to soup. He was spent. Cotton wool. Complete and total memory loss.

“Sorry, you need to do a complete retake.”

“Huh?” He’d barely registered that John had answered him.

“I said I can’t just reset the test. The training materials and quiz are linked in one programme and you need to go right back to the beginning.”

“You mean I have to go through all _that_ again?” He gestured weakly at the tablet, still lying discarded on the table with his abysmal result on display.

“Afraid so.”

“And there’s no way to just skip to the end part? C’mon John, you must be able to do that. I know this stuff. You know I know this stuff. Do I really have to go through the whole damn thing?”

“Sorry, it’s not worth risking having you grounded if some jumped up GDF tech spots their programme has been tampered with.”

He groaned. As if the 3 hours of his life wasted so far wasn’t bad enough, with no short cuts to the end he’d likely be stuck there until dinner time. 

And then he had to face the test. Again. 

He wondered if he could bribe a brother to sit and do all the clicking for him and then he could just attack the quiz with a clear head at the end. But no, that would involve admitting to his failure and this was something that was staying between him and John. He could trust John not to mention this fiasco ever again; the same could not be said for any of the others.

“If it’s any consolation I had to do it as well and even less of it applies to me. I mean, the correct techniques for manual handling are hardly relevant in zero gravity.”

Virgil snorted. Nope, the instructional video of how to properly lift a box definitely did not bear any resemblance to life on Thunderbird Five. 

With a resigned sigh he slid the tablet back closer and hit the only option on the screen.

Redo.


End file.
